Combining adaptive automation and adaptive teams in a naval command centre

Motivation - Adaptive teams and adaptive automation promote a flexible work division between humans mutually and between humans and machine in order to overcome limitations in human information processing under highly variable workloads. We wanted to construct a framework that enables both system-supported adaptability in a team and adaptive automation using the same concept. Research approach - A situated iterative cognitive engineering approach was used to establish a set of requirements for the system support of adaptive teams. Findings/Design - A framework that supports a number of different work allocation schemes can be constructed. The schemes are compared using informal narrative descriptions. The framework accommodates the teams currently used in command centres of naval ships and could aid in the adaptability of such teams. Research Limitations/Implications - This study accommodates the hierarchical teams that are common in defence organisations. A re-evaluation is necessary when the model is applied to other organisations. Originality/Value - The research extends the research on adaptive automation with a team-centred design that uses the same concepts for system and team adaptation. Take away message - Adaptive teams and adaptive automation can be combined into a single framework that uses the same concepts for cooperation between users mutually and between users and system that does not unduly complicate the design of the system algorithms